


The Distance and Other Drabbles

by Maidenjedi



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Drabble Collection, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-15
Updated: 2012-07-15
Packaged: 2017-11-10 01:08:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/460553
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maidenjedi/pseuds/Maidenjedi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ten drabbles written for a challenge in 2009.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Distance and Other Drabbles

**Author's Note:**

> 10 Music Drabbles  
> 1\. Pick a character, pairing, or fandom you like.  
> 2\. Turn on your music player and put it on random/shuffle.  
> 3\. Write a drabble related to each song that plays. You only have the time frame of the song to finish the drabble; you start when the song starts, and stop when it's over. No lingering afterwards!  
> 4\. Do ten of these, then post them.

Interstate Love Song by Stone Temple Pilots (XF, Mulder/Diana, pre-series)

Diana left on a Sunday afternoon. Presumably this was because she had training to go to before she could start her job in Berlin.

But she bought train tickets to Baltimore, and from there to Boston, and it made no sense to hop a plane from Massachusetts when she could fly out from Dulles.

Not that he cared anymore. Mulder was tired of trying to get past her lies and suss out the truth. 

He thought about their first kiss, on a case in Florida. About the first time they slept together, in a cheap motel in Maine (a tiny little town called Derry, with all those weird deaths - Mulder remembered that as much as he did the sex). The first time they talked about having kids was in Iowa, when Mulder was waxing nostalgic about baseball and Little League.

This was the first time she'd ever left him. It happened in Maryland.

\---

Nowhere Man by Paul Westerberg (XF, Mulder, pre-Pilot)

Stuck. He was stuck in an elevator at the Hoover Building after 6pm on a Friday night.

No one even knew he was still there. It had been six months since Diana left and he hadn't found a new partner. Not that he was looking very hard.

And they were between Assistant Directors, so no boss would ride his ass for this one.

Stuck in a freakin' elevator.

On a Friday night.

Mulder sat down and started fishing in his pocket for sunflower seeds. Of course there weren't any, he never had them in his pants pockets. It was a crazy habit.

Somewhere right now, guys his age were picking up chicks at bars. Or maybe they were married and having kids.

Mulder? He was chasing demons and ghosts from a basement. They called him Spooky for a reason.

The elevator starting moving an hour later and Mulder went home.

To nobody.

\--

I Love it When She Does That by Chris Cagle (XF, Mulder/Scully, Pilot

Agent Dana Scully had been on the X-Files for less than fifteen hours when Mulder figured out that she was going to be a problem.

She smiled and his heart dropped into his stomach. She scowled and his fingers itched to smooth it away. He had several other reactions to her smooth, just-out-of-grad-school skin and her dark shoulder-length hair that begged for hands to muss it up.

Damn, this was trouble.

And she had no idea what she was doing to him. Women never knew things like that. Not that Mulder knew from experience or anything.

Now Dana Scully was flying into his arms, mostly naked, on a rainy night in Oregon. Far away from the Bureau's prying eyes and rules.

He hoped she didn't feel his erection. He felt like a teenager.

So he gently pushed her away and sat on the floor. She must have gotten the idea because she sat on the bed.

Yeah, this was gonna be trouble, all right.

\---

Crucify by Tori Amos (XF, Mulder/Scully, circa early season 2)

Of course they closed down the X-files. It made so much sense! They'd been getting too close, too good at this. 

Bullshit. Mulder was playing the martyr and she'd be damned if she did the same.

She had that offer from St. Mary's Hospital, she could go right now. Get on with her life. It was clear that she'd put too much into this whole rebel FBI thing.

But there wasn't anyone left who wanted to argue her into doing the sensible thing. Go be a doctor, do something real with her life.

What was more real than this?

Liver-eating mutants and all?

Scully (when did she become "Scully" and not "Dana?") was ready to walk back to her car instead of meeting with Mulder as planned. She wasn't ready to crucify herself for another man in her life, not even someone like Mulder. He understood, he got it, he pushed her and never asked too many questions. Not like...well, like Jack, and like Daniel.

But Mulder also wasn't her lover.

That was the difference.

She decided to meet him after all. And she couldn't help touching him. 

But she wouldn't die for him. Oh no.

\---

The Joker by the Steve Miller Band (XF, Mulder/Scully, post-Syzygy)

"Some people call me a space cowboy," Mulder was singing just under his breath.

It was driving Scully nuts. She hated that song.

But he didn't particularly care. She was driving, and she smelled like cigarettes.

Not like his favorite perfume, which apparently happened to be Angela White's favorite, too.

"People keep talking about me baby," he sang.

Scully glared at him.

They'd be getting home soon, and neither of them would talk about this. Not until years had passed, and Scully could hear the phrase "really love your peaches want to shake your tree" without socking Mulder in the arm.

\---

The Distance by Cake (XF, Scully, post-Requiem)

It wasn't about the truth, really, as much as it was about beating them.

Scully was aware of it, had been since that awful night in the basement when someone had torched their office. 

Mulder was driven to succeed now at any cost. 

That's why he went back to Bellefleur, and she was left here in this hospital carrying a child she couldn't explain.

He was always so good at finding an explanation, damnit! She needed him here.

And he was gone, abducted, taken, whatever word you wanted to use.

Because he had to win. He had to beat them at their game.

Whoever they were.

She didn't rest much after that. After all, if he couldn't give up, neither would she.

\---

Swing Wide the Glimmering Gates by Andrew Osenga (XF, Mulder, post-DeadAlive)

He was back. 

Or was he?

Mulder pinched himself, for what was probably the millionth time since he woke up in that hospital with a crying, praying Scully by his side.

There was quite a bruise on his arm now.

He insisted on taking a day to himself, to try and get his bearings. Funny how he'd gotten lost on roads he'd once known so well.

He drove to Greenwich but didn't go in the house. He sat in the yard, under the tree his mother had always wanted chopped down. His father always refused, he liked the shade.

Mulder took a breath and looked up at the sky through the tree's tangled branches. It was cold outside, but he didn't really care. It was numbing and he wanted to be numb.

Or was it invigorating?

He couldn't tell and that was what was driving him crazy.

The sun blinked down at him and Mulder changed his thoughts to the child in Scully's womb. That was the biggest change, the hardest thing to believe was real.

He wanted to believe.

He didn't think about the mundanities, like who was the father and all that. He just marveled that she was so big, and he'd missed it.

He sat under the tree and let the sun wash him clean.

When he went back, it was to Scully, and to whatever might await.

\---

The Same Boy You've Always Known by the White Stripes (XF, William, post-series)

He was William when he was born, but he didn't really know that. He imagined it sometimes, though.

He was Justin when he was going through school, elementary classes with Big Chief tablets and oversized pencils, The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe. Later it was grammar tests and spelling bees, and he was Justin then, but William lurked under the surface.

Who was he? Did he belong to the Van de Camps? Was he someone else?

Who was William?

"I'm the same boy, Ma," he told her, when he was ready to find out more.

\---

The Girl Who Falls Downstairs by Tom McRae (XF, Mulder/Scully, post-series)

"I'm...well, I'm leaving."

She couldn't say his name, because they weren't who they *were*.

Wasn't that a refrain she'd heard before?

He wouldn't believe her. So she just left, tired of fighting a fight without words.

She missed him, of course. In between. 

She became someone else, hid behind long hair and a stranger's name.

He was there to rescue her in the end. He showed up just when she was at the end of her proverbial rope, ready to scream to break to run to fall.

He stood at the bottom of the stairs in the hospital she worked at and held his hand out.

"Scully."

Her name was enough.

She was no longer someone else.

 

She belonged to him.

\----

10 - Silent All These Years by Tori Amos (XF, Teena Mulder, Sein und Zeit)

 

She had relics of the past in a box in the basement and sometimes she would go downstairs and look at them.

She wouldn't touch them.

Years flew by and she didn't open the boxes, flip through photo albums.

She was too busy repressing it all.

She lied to Fox. Over and over she told her son lies about everything, from how her health was to who was really his father. It was sick and she just kept telling them over and over. 

And when she wasn't talking she was silent.

So when she made the decision to end it, she wanted to speak up.

She went to the basement and unpacked boxes, choked on the dust and unpacked more.

The photo albums covered the lies, but only barely.

So in the end it wasn't so hard. Except that Fox never did call her back. And she never had a chance to tell him.


End file.
